<<Hey, nice look>> she said, as they were waiting in the cake queue. <<It's kinda reptilian, but not as ghoulish as those punks down on Haight-Ashbury. I like it.>>

Mustafa pulled out a business card which described him as: INTERNATIONAL VAGABOND. He invited Magda to a lecture he was giving at Berkeley University.

<<I'd come to the talk>> she said <<but I'm too much of a 21st century woman. You're not cut my fucking clit out are you?>>

<<Islam>> he said in a voice which recalled heyday Omar Sharif (and it's messianic qualities were just as devastating) <<Islam isn't fundamentalism, Islam isn't empty ritual. I preach a new kind of Islam, a 21st century kind of Islam, a mystifying, self-glorifying third millennium brand of Islam.>>

(Huddled in threes and fours on the village square, the people of the wadi awaited the Israeli onslaught in afternoon sunshine. The mortar fire had abated but tanks were mobilising in the valley below. What came was a grey Mitsubishi Lancer, early 21st century design -- a rude retro dash in the sweltering sun.)

<<All right>> Magda said <<I'll come!>>